itself. But though he has
added these excrescences, and erected a sort of platform in front of
the last, whence he and his friends might enjoy, at their pleasure, a
view of the surrounding country, he has taken nothing away; and the
public are much indebted to him, and to his successor, for the
liberality with which they are admitted to behold one of the most
curious specimens of baronial architecture, which is anywhere to be
found.

Nearly two hours having been spent in examining the different objects
just described, we began to feel that food and drink would be
acceptable; and our guide,--a civil woman,--having assured us that both
were to be procured in the cottage below, to it we adjourned. The bill
of fare, however, consisted merely of brown bread,--sour, as all German
brown bread is, and made of rye,--of butter and beer. Nobody has a
right to complain who has at his disposal a competent supply of good
brown bread and butter; but to our unpractised palates, the rye-meal,
and sour leaven, were not very inviting. Still we set to work, and
aided by a cat, and a fine bold fellow of a dunghill cock, both of whom
took post beside us, and insisted on sharing our meal, we made a pretty
considerable inroad into the good woman's vivres, whose butter and beer
were both of them excellent. This, with a rest of half an hour, made us
feel up to our work; so we disbursed our groschen or two, strapped on
our packs, and pursued our journey.

Gabel was our point, towards which from Hayde a good chaussee runs; but
we had no disposition to retrace our steps to Hayde,--so, trusting in
part to the map, in part to the directions which our good-natured
hostess gave us, we struck across the country at a venture. Probably we
did not commit a greater number of blunders than any other persons
similarly circumstanced would have done, but the way seemed at once
intricate and interminable. I doubt, indeed, whether we should have
succeeded in reaching our destination at all, had we not, by good
fortune, overtaken in the heart of a wood an honest countryman, who was
journeying towards his home in the fair village of Leipsige, and
volunteered to be so far our guide. We found him intelligent enough on
his own topic of agriculture, and well inclined to communicate to us
his family history; but he knew nothing about either Peter of Prague,
or the gypsies, and had never seen either Napoleon or his troops. We
were, therefore, forced to take his guidan